Prompt Playbook: Tiktokification of Social Media PART 4
To succeed on your platform of choice you need to know it inside-out.
What works on Instagram won’t work on Tiktok. What works on TikTok won’t work on Youtube.
Each platform and audience has different expectations and you’ll need to (initially!) conform to that in order to get traction.
This requires deep understand of how to produce specifically for the platform.
Let’s get started
Native Production
Summary
Native Production
learn the creative units of the platform
copy first, learn from the masters
roadblocks are a chance to learn
produce natively and use everything they give you
make it obvious what your content is about
Creative units
First up we need to know what Gary Vee calls the “creative units” of the platform.
What are the types of content we can do. Tiktok for example has
15s videos
60s videos
3m videos
Up to 60 mins videos (brand new!)
Stories up to 15s
Photo upload
Carousel
Text
Lives
This list can and will change. You need to know what the basic units are on your platform of choice. You’ll gain this familiarity by playing around and making content using all the different creative units.
Which ones to test? Follow your Format list that you compiled which contains the most popular formats in your niche.
For example I’ve never seen a text post on Tiktok.
That tells me that TikTok isn’t boosting them to audiences. It’s not a priority for them.
Should you test one, just in case? Of course you should! Test everything. Maybe this is a massive opportunity. But chances are (probably!) that it’s just not a creative unit that does well on the platform.
How to start
I’d recommend copying to get started. Straight up duplication of what seems to be popular in your niche.
This lets you practice and get your hand in on the different creative units and formats.
As an example early on on TikTok I saw a popular video that was an AI influencer listing out her favourite accounts on the platform.
I copied the topic (favourite accounts) and the format (green-screen) and put together a quick video:
At the time of writing this
has 600,000 views
gained me 27,000 followers
Was it original? Not at all. I basically replicated someone else’s video but plugged in my own recommendation.
But I knew it was a format that does well. And it did.
Your job with your first videos is similar. Do not get creative.
First learn your tools by copying. The Great Masters of art worked in this way - endlessly copying those who came before them. If it worked for them it’ll sure as hell work for our social media content!
How do I xyz?
As you start replicating what others have made you’ll run into things you don’t know how to do.
This is part and parcel of learning!
How do we learn how to do these things? We could go and get a course but that’s overkill. We just need the answer to whatever our block is right now.
For example when I started out I had no idea how to do green-screen. In TikTok it’s hidden away as an Effect. Not obvious.
What’s the best way to get these answers?
Sounds stupid but here it is: search for the answer on the platform itself.
For example if you want to learn how to do greenscreen on Tiktok search on TikTok “how to do greenscreen on Tiktok”.
How to add captions in Instagram? Search on Instagram “how to add captions Instagram”.
Finding the information directly on the platform will be more up to date and useful than heading to Google. It’s one of those things that sounds obvious but only when you hear it!
Produce natively
Wherever possible use the creative tools inside your platform of choice to create your content.
This means shooting and editing Tiktok videos in Tiktok and shoot Instagram Reels using Instagram.
The platforms know where you made the content and will tend to prioritise anything created using their tools. This makes sense - TikTok wants to know your content is made for them, not made on Instagram first and uploaded onto TikTok.
This recommendation extends to using all the production tools at your disposal.
For instance when adding a video on Tiktok you can
add captions
add text overlays
add stickers
add licensed music
add effects
add hashtags
add your location
add a sticker inviting other people to use that effect
and more…
These features exist for a reason. The platform want us to use them as they increase engagement or help with discoverability. To “reward” us for using them the platform will generally push our content more. It’s a win-win.
Does that means stuff every piece of content with trending sounds and effects? No.
The video still needs to match what our audience want - so as always follow your Format and Topic lists. Copy what works and test.
Make it easy to find
This is a more subtle recommendation.
As we move from the social graph to the interest graph what our content is about is more important than who we are.
Remember that under the new Tiktok algorithm (and spreading to other platforms) our content will be shown to a sample of people and then, depending on their response, to more?
To do this successfully the platform needs to know what our content is about.
On TikTok it’s actually easy to see if the platform knows how to categorise your content.
Check the Search Bar above your content
See how that says “Find Related Content”?
That means that Tiktok doesn’t know how to categorise this video. That’s my fault - I didn’t give it enough context.
Ideally that should have a term like “ChatGPT”, “AI” or "(preferably) “handsome dude” instead of “find related content”.
Those would mean that Tiktok knows the content of the video and thus is more able to show it to the right people during its tests.
To make sure the platform knows what your content is
Make sure you know what the content is about. Keep it focused on one thing!
If speaking mention the topic several times. Platforms transcribe your voice and will use the script to categorise.
Add an on-screen title that includes the topic.
Mention the topic in the description.
Add related hashtags if the platform uses them.
Basically give several strong indications about what the content is actually about. The more you add the more likely the platform is to pick up on the clues and thus categories it properly.
Moving forward
Continue to produce content, guided by your lists, natively on your platform until something hits.
How long will that take? No way to say.
But because of the way interest based algorithms treat each piece of content independently you can just keep smacking away until one hits.
The first hit (probably!) won’t go to 1 million views. Technically, thanks to how these algorithms work, it can! But… don’t expect this.
Instead you are looking for the first content piece that does better than all the others.
If all your content does 200 views and then one goes to 1000 that’s a hit.
Do more of that. Less of the other formats and topics that lead to 200.
Follow what the platform is telling you. Not what you think is good. It hurts but swallow your ego for now.
If a piece works - do it again. Better this time.
Don’t worry about doing content pieces you think are the “same”. Here’s the kicker - the same people won’t be seeing the same content.
I’ve done maybe 10 videos on my RISEN™ framework. Most have a few hundred or thousand views. One has 2.1 million views. Another has 3.6 million views. Those big ones were seen by 99.9% new people.
Keep pushing on and making slightly bigger wins step by step. Consistency and volume are the key. The more you do the more you learn and the higher your chances of a hit - no way around that!
When you have a hit we can get smart and use it to drive business. More on that in the next Part.
Keep prompting,
Kyle